Very less knowing facts about US Supreme Court

Since its creation by Article III of the U.S. Constitution, the Supreme Court has handed down decisions that have shaped American history, from civil rights to election issues to the powers of business and government. Known as the court of last resort, the Supreme Court has the final authority to interpret constitutional questions and federal law and to uphold or reverse decisions made by lower courts. To date, there have been 112 justices (including 17 chief justices) in the court’s history, 108 men and four women. Find out some surprising facts about the job (hint: there are no official qualifications) and learn about how the nation’s highest court works and has changed over the years.

1. The court was around for 145 years before it got a permanent home of its own.

The court convened for the first time in February 1790 in New York City, then the nation’s capital. From 1791 to 1800, it assembled in Philadelphia, which served as the capital while Washington, D.C., was under construction. Starting in February 1801, the court began meeting in Washington, where it occupied various sites in the Capitol building for more than a century. (After the British burned the Capitol in 1814, the court even temporarily met in a private home.) In 1929, at the urging of Chief Justice William Taft, Congress authorized some $9.74 million to erect a building the court could call its own. The marble structure, in use since 1935, was designed by architect Cass Gilbert Sr., whose projects included New York City’s Woolworth Building (the world’s tallest skyscraper from 1913 to 1930), along with several state capitols and other public works. Today, the building features its own police force as well as a top-floor gym, with a basketball court nicknamed “the highest court in the land.” Shooting hoops and lifting weights are banned while court is in session, however.

2. There haven’t always been nine justices on the court.

The U.S. Constitution established the Supreme Court but left it to Congress to decide how many justices should make up the court. The Judiciary Act of 1789 set the number at six: a chief justice and five associate justices. In 1807, Congress increased the number of justices to seven; in 1837, the number was bumped up to nine; and in 1863, it rose to 10. In 1866, Congress passed the Judicial Circuits Act, which shrank the number of justices back down to seven and prevented President Andrew Johnson from appointing anyone new to the court. Three years later, in 1869, Congress raised the number of justices to nine, where it has stood ever since. In 1937, in an effort to create a court more friendly to his New Deal programs, President Franklin Roosevelt attempted to convince Congress to pass legislation that would allow a new justice to be added to the court—for a total of up to 15 members—for every justice over 70 who opted not to retire. Congress didn’t go for FDR’s plan.

3. There are no official qualifications for becoming a Supreme Court justice.

The Constitution spells out age, citizenship and residency requirements for becoming president of the United States or a member of Congress but mentions no rules for joining the nation’s highest court. To date, six justices have been foreign born; the most recent, Felix Frankfurter, who served on the court from 1939 to 1962, was a native of Vienna, Austria. The youngest associate justice ever appointed was Joseph Story, who was 32 years old when he joined the bench in 1811. Associate Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., who served from 1902 to 1932, retired at age 90, making him the oldest person ever to sit on the court. One thing every justice who’s served shares in common is that all were lawyers prior to joining the court. During the 18th and 19th centuries, before attending law school was standard practice, many future justices got their legal training by studying under a mentor. James Byrnes, who served on the court from 1941 to 1942, was the last justice who didn’t attend law school (Byrnes, who also didn’t graduate from high school, worked as a law clerk and later passed the bar exam.) Harvard has produced more members of the court than any other law school; to date, 20 justices have attended or graduated from the venerable institution, which was established in 1817 and is America’s oldest continually operating law school.

4. Justices are appointed for life but can be impeached.

Associate Justice William O. Douglas put in 36 years and 7 months on the bench, from April 1939 to November 1975, the longest tenure of any justice in the court’s history. Douglas’ successor, John Paul Stevens, was part of the court from December 1975 to June 2010, making him the third-longest serving justice. (Steven Johnson Field, who served from 1863 to 1897, comes in second.) Although they are appointed for life, more than 50 have chosen to retire or resign; that number has included the likes of John Jay, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., Charles Evan Hughes, Earl Warren, Thurgood Marshall, and, more recently, William Rehnquist and Sandra Day O’Connor. Only one justice ever has been impeached: Samuel Chase, in 1804. The U.S. House of Representatives voted to impeach Chase, an outspoken figure accused of acting in a partisan way during various court proceedings; however, the U.S. Senate acquitted him in 1805 and he remained on the bench, where he had served since 1796, until his death in 1811.

5. William Howard Taft is the only person to have served as U.S. president and on the court.

Taft served as America’s 27th president, from 1909 to 1913, during which time he appointed five associate justices and one chief justice. After losing his bid for re-election, Taft, a graduate of Yale University and Cincinnati Law School, and a judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals prior to his presidency, went on to teach law at Yale and serve as head of the American Bar Association, among other activities. In 1921, following the death of Chief Justice Edward Douglass White, whom Taft had appointed when he was in the White House, President Warren Harding nominated Taft as White’s replacement. As the court’s 10th chief justice, Taft successfully advocated for passage of the Judiciary Act of 1925, which enabled the justices to choose which cases they wanted to hear (today, the court follows the so-called rule of four, by which at least four justices must vote to grant a petition to review a case before it can be heard by the court). Taft served as chief justice until February 1930, when he resigned due to poor health; he died the following month.

6. George Washington appointed the most justices to the court.

The president of the United States has the sole power to nominate Supreme Court justices whenever there are openings on the court, and each nomination must be confirmed by the U.S. Senate. George Washington made 11 appointments to the court, while Franklin Roosevelt made the second highest number of appointments, nine. Only three presidents besides Andrew Johnson did not make appointments: William Henry Harrison (who died in 1841, a month after his inauguration), Zachary Taylor (who passed away in 1850, 16 months after taking office) and Jimmy Carter. To date, presidents have submitted 160 nominations, including nominations for chief justice. Of that total, 124 were confirmed, with seven of them opting not to take the job. America’s 10th president, John Tyler, who assumed office after the death of William Henry Harrison, made nine nominations while in office from 1841 to 1845, but the politically unpopular Tyler managed to get just one of those nominations confirmed by the Senate.

7. In recent years, the court has received some 10,000 annual requests to review cases, but hears only about 80.

The justices usually only take on cases involving significant legal principles or cases in which lower courts have disagreed about the interpretation of federal laws. Most of the court’s cases come to it on appeal from lower federal courts and state courts; however, the Supreme Court has original jurisdiction (the right to hear a case for the first time, before any appellate review) in a few instances, such as cases involving ambassadors or disputes between two or more states. Because the justices primarily hear cases on appeal, it’s uncommon for witnesses or evidence to be presented in court. Instead, attorneys submit written legal arguments (briefs) in advance and justices typically listen to oral arguments, in which each side has 30 minutes to make a presentation, during which the justices can ask questions. (The courtroom is open to the public during oral arguments, which are not allowed to be televised or photographed; since 1955, the court has made audio recordings of oral arguments, which are released after the arguments are over.) The justices later meet in private to discuss and vote on each case. In the event of a tie vote, the decision of the lower court is upheld.

World's first talking robot-astronaut ready to go to space

In a world first, Japan is set to send a talking robot-astronaut to the International Space Station to conduct the first conversation between a human and a robot in outer space.

Kirobo, the robot astronaut, is scheduled to be launched from the Tanegashima Space Center, located in southwestern Japan's Kagoshima Prefecture, aboard the Kounotori 4 cargo spacecraft to ISS on August 4.

Named after a combination of the Japanese word kibo, or "hope", and the word "robot", the Kirobo project is part of an experiment that will see the first human-robot conversation held in space, the 'Japan Daily Press' reported.

Kirobo is about 34 centimetres tall and weighs about one kilogramme, which makes it smaller than most robots that go into space.

The robot has already undergone several pre-launch tests, including simulations with zero gravity, the report said.

During one of the first demonstrations, the robot's developers asked Kirobo what its dream was. It replied that it "hoped to create a future where humans and robots live together and get along."

Kirobo, the talking robot, was jointly developed by the University of Tokyo, Toyota, and Dentsu Inc.

With new tech, any surface can be touchscreen

A latest experimental technology system, called WorldKit reportedly turns any surface into a touchscreen by pairing a depth-sensing camera lens with a projector lens.

According to Fox News, WorldKit's aim is to transform all of the surroundings into touchscreens, equipping walls, tables, and couches with interactive and intuitive controls.

Chris Harrison, a soonto-be professor in human computer interaction at Carnegie Mellon University and Robert Xiao, a PhD candidate at Carnegie Mellon and lead researcher have together come up with the latest innovation. Harrison said that it is an interesting space of having projected interfaces on the environment, using the whole world as a sort of gigantic tablet.

Xiao said that the technology allows users to select a surface and 'paint' an interactive object on it like a 'button' or a 'sensor' after which the selected area is used to display a chosen interface, such as a menu bar or a sliding lighting-control dial, which can then be manipulated through touch gestures.

The report said that WorldKit's depth sensor is connected to a projector that is mounted to a ceiling or a tripod and its major drawback is its big size.

Experts are positive of exploiting the technology for use in the mobile market in near future and are also envisioning ambitious applications for the technology like experimental interior design which could also be included in gaming potential.

Explaining the contrast between WorldKit and Google's wearable Glass, Xiao said that WorldKit is at an advantage as all the interactions are out in the world and one is thus interacting with something real and tangible, unlike Glass which allows only virtual seeing and not touching, the report said.

Conversation Between, Former President of India, "APJ Abdul Kalam" and His Teacher

A.P.J. Abdul Kalam
Former President of India

An atheist professor of philosophy speaks to his class on the problem science has with God, The Almighty.

He asks one of his new students to stand and.....

Prof:  So you believe in God?

Student: Absolutely, sir.

Prof: Is God good?

Student: Sure.

Prof: Is God all-powerful?

Student: Yes.

Prof: My brother died of cancer even though he prayed to God to heal him.

Most of us would attempt to help others who are ill. But God didn't. How is this God good then? Hmm?

(Student is silent.)

Prof: You can't answer, can you? Let's start again, young fella. Is God good?

Student: Yes.

Prof: Is Satan(Devil) good?

Student: No.

Prof: Where does Satan come from?

Student: From...God.. .

Prof: That's right. Tell me son, is there evil in this world?

Student: Yes.

Prof: Evil is everywhere, isn't it? And God did make everything. Correct?

Student: Yes.

Prof: So who created evil?

(Student does not answer.)

Prof: Is there sickness? Immorality? Hatred? Ugliness? All these terrible things exist in the world, don't they?

Student: Yes, sir.

Prof: So, who created them?

(Student has no answer.)

Prof: Science says you have 5 senses you use to identify and observe the world around you.

Tell me, son...Have you ever seen God?

Student: No, sir.

Prof: Tell us if you have ever heard your God?

Student: No, sir.

Prof: Have you ever felt your God, tasted your God, smelt your God? Have you ever had any sensory perception of God for that matter?

Student: No, sir. I'm afraid I haven't.

Prof: Yet you still believe in Him?

Student: Yes.

Prof: According to empirical, testable, demonstrable protocol, science says your GOD doesn't exist.

What do you say to that, son?

Student: Nothing. I only have my faith.

Prof: Yes. Faith. And that is the problem science has.

Student: Professor, is there such a thing as heat?

Prof: Yes.

Student: And is there such a thing as cold?

Prof: Yes.

Student: No sir. There isn't.

(The lecture theatre becomes very quiet with this turn of events.)

Student: Sir, you can have lots of heat, even more heat, superheat, mega heat, white heat, a little heat or no heat. But we don't have anything called cold. We can hit 458 degrees below zero which is no heat, but we can't go any further after that. There is no such thing as cold . Cold is only a word we use to describe the absence of heat. We cannot measure cold. Heat is energy . Cold is not the opposite of heat, sir, just the absence of it.

(There is pin-drop silence in the lecture theatre.)

Student: What about darkness, Professor? Is there such a thing as darkness?

Prof: Yes. What is night if there isn't darkness?

Student: You're wrong again, sir. Darkness is the absence of something. You can have low light, normal light, bright light, flashing light....But if you have no light constantly, you have nothing and it's called darkness, isn't it? In reality, darkness isn't. If it were you would be able to make darkness darker, wouldn't you?

Prof: So what is the point you are making, young man?

Student: Sir, my point is your philosophical premise is flawed.

Prof: Flawed? Can you explain how?

Student: Sir, you are working on the premise of duality. You argue there is life and then there is death, a good God and a bad God. You are viewing the concept of God as something finite, something we can measure. Sir, science can't even explain a thought. It uses electricity and magnetism, but has never seen, much less fully understood either one.To view death as the opposite of life is to be ignorant of the fact that death cannot exist as a substantive thing. Death is not the opposite of life: just the absence of it.

Now tell me, Professor.Do you teach your students that they evolved from a monkey?

Prof: If you are referring to the natural evolutionary process, yes, of course, I do.

Student: Have you ever observed evolution with your own eyes, sir?

(The Professor shakes his head with a smile, beginning to realize where the argument is going.)

Student: Since no one has ever observed the process of evolution at work and cannot even prove that this process is an on-going endeavor, are you not teaching your opinion, sir? Are you not a scientist but a preacher? (The class is in uproar.)

Student: Is there anyone in the class who has ever seen the Professor's brain?

(The class breaks out into laughter.)

Student: Is there anyone here who has ever heard the Professor's brain, felt it, touched or smelt it? No one appears to have done so. So, according to the established rules of empirical, stable, demonstrable protocol, science says that you have no brain, sir.

With all due respect, sir, how do we then trust your lectures, sir?

(The room is silent. The professor stares at the student, his face unfathomable. )

Prof: I guess you'll have to take them on faith, son.

Student: That is it sir... The link between man & god is FAITH . That is all that keeps things moving & alive.

This is a true story, and the student was none other than........ .

APJ Abdul Kalam , the former president of India.

A series of fight turns into festival: La Tomatina

Parade of Gigantes Y Cabezudos, 1945

In 1945, during a parade of gigantes y cabezudos, “Giants and Big-Heads costumes parade”, young adults who wanted to be in the event staged a brawl in town's main square, the Plaza del Pueblo, pushed the other young people. One of the young people fell on the floor, and when he got up he started to hit everyone there, so everybody started fighting. There was a vegetable stand nearby, so they picked up tomatoes and used them as weapons. The police had to intervene to break up the fight and forced those responsible to pay the damages incurred.

The following year the young people repeated the fight on the same Wednesday of August, only this time they brought their own tomatoes from home. They were again dispersed by the police. After repeating this in subsequent years, the tradition was established. In 1950, the towns allowed the tomato hurl to take place, however the next year it was again stopped. A lot of young people were imprisoned but the Buñol residents forced the authorities to let them go. The festival gained popularity with more and more participants getting involved every year. After subsequent years it was banned again with threats of serious penalties. In the year 1957, some young people planned to celebrate "the tomato's funeral" as a protest, with singers, musicians, and comedies. The main attraction however, was the coffin with a big tomato inside being carried around by youth and a band playing the funeral marches. Considering this popularity of the festival and the alarming demand, 1957 saw the festival becoming official with certain rules and restrictions. These rules have gone through a lot of modifications over the years.

People Celebrating "the tomato's funeral"

Another important landmark in the history of this festival is the year 1975. From this year onwards, "Los Clavarios de San Luis Bertrán" (San Luis Bertrán is the patron of the town of Buñol ) organised the whole festival and brought in tomatoes which had previously been brought by the local people. Soon after this, in 1980, the town hall took the responsibility of organizing the festival.

In the early years of 1700 to 1900 why European people feared of tomatoes

In the late 1700s, a large percentage of Europeans feared the tomato.

A nickname for the fruit was the “poison apple” because it was thought that aristocrats got sick and died after eating them, but the truth of the matter was that wealthy Europeans used pewter plates, which were high in lead content. Because tomatoes are so high in acidity, when placed on this particular tableware, the fruit would leach lead from the plate, resulting in many deaths from lead poisoning. No one made this connection between plate and poison at the time; the tomato was picked as the culprit.

Pewter Plate

Around 1880, with the invention of the pizza in Naples, the tomato grew widespread in popularity in Europe. But there’s a little more to the story behind the misunderstood fruit’s stint of unpopularity in England and America, as Andrew F. Smith details in his The Tomato in America: Early History, Culture, and Cookery. The tomato didn’t get blamed just for what was really lead poisoning. Before the fruit made its way to the table in North America, it was classified as a deadly nightshade, a poisonous family of Solanaceae plants that contain toxins called tropane alkaloids.

One of the earliest-known European references to the food was made by the Italian herbalist, Pietro Andrae Matthioli, who first classified the “golden apple” as a nightshade and a mandrake—a category of food known as an aphrodisiac. The mandrake has a history that dates back to the Old Testament; it is referenced twice as the Hebrew word dudaim, which roughly translates to “love apple.” (In Genesis, the mandrake is used as a love potion). Matthioli’s classification of the tomato as a mandrake had later ramifications. Like similar fruits and vegetables in the solanaceae family—the eggplant for example, the tomato garnered a shady reputation for being both poisonous and a source of temptation. (Editor’s note: This sentence has been edited to clarify that it was the mandrake, not the tomato, that is believed to have been referenced in the Old Testament)
But what really did the tomato in, according to Smith’s research, was John Gerard’s publication of Herball in 1597 which drew heavily from the agricultural works of Dodoens and l’Ecluse (1553). According to Smith, most of the information (which was inaccurate to begin with) was plagiarized by Gerard, a barber-surgeon who misspelled words like Lycoperticum in the collection’s rushed final product. Smith quotes Gerard:
Gerard considered ‘the whole plant’ to be ‘of ranke and stinking savour.’… The fruit was corrupt which he left to every man’s censure. While the leaves and stalk of the tomato plant are toxic, the fruit is not.
Gerard’s opinion of the tomato, though based on a fallacy, prevailed in Britain and in the British North American colonies for over 200 years.
Around this time it was also believed that tomatoes were best eaten in hotter countries, like the fruit’s place of origin in Mesoamerica. The tomato was eaten by the Aztecs as early as 700 AD and called the “tomatl,” (its name in Nahuatl), and wasn’t grown in Britain until the 1590s. In the early 16th century, Spanish conquistadors returning from expeditions in Mexico and other parts of Mesoamerica were thought to have first introduced the seeds to southern Europe. Some researchers credit Cortez with bringing the seeds to Europe in 1519 for ornamental purposes. Up until the late 1800s in cooler climates, tomatoes were solely grown for ornamental purposes in gardens rather than for eating. Smith continues:
John Parkinson the apothecary to King James I and botanist for King Charles I, procalimed that while love apples were eaten by the people in the hot countries to ‘coole and quench the heate and thirst of the hot stomaches,” British gardeners grew them only for curiousity and fo the beauty of the fruit.

A technology is used for converting water in electricity: myFC POWERTREKK

Intro

myFC PowerTrekk is the preferred alternative portable power source for outdoor enthusiasts, travelers and other people who spend time away from the grid. myFC PowerTrekk is also the ideal safety kit option, since it gives you access to instant power by using small amount of water.

THE TECHNOLOGY BEHIND IT

myFC PowerTrekk uses  green fuel cell technology, which cleanly and efficiently converts hydrogen into electricity. The ability to simply insert a myFC Puck and add water provides users with instant and limitless power on the go. Unlike solar chargers, fuel cell power is generated quickly (no waiting for sunlight harvesting) and reliably (charging speed not impacted by weather, solar position etc. and no power degradation like with batteries).

At the heart of the myFC PowerTrekk is myFC's proprietary FuelCellSticker technology. Made from foils and adhesives, the FuelCellStickers form a flexible unit, less than 2.75mm thick.

The fuel cell inside myFC PowerTrekk is a completely passive system. Without fans or pumps, the fuel cell silently converts hydrogen into electricity via its Proton Exchange Membrane.

The chemical process is safe, controllable and eco-friendly, and the only bi-product from the fuel cell is a little water vapor. To operate, hydrogen must be supplied to the fuel cell, and the fuel cell must be exposed to air.

myFC PowerTrekk and the myFC Puck meet industry security standards and can be brought on airplanes in the passenger cabin.

WHAT IS FUEL CELL TECHNOLOGY AND HOW DOES IT WORK?

A fuel cell is an electrochemical device that transforms the chemical energy of a fuel (hydrogen, methanol, natural gas, gasoline etc.) and an oxidant (air or oxygen) into electrical energy. The fuel and the oxidant react at two different electrodes – the anode and the cathode – and are separated by an electrolyte that transmits ions (e.g. H+, OH- etc.) from one electrode to the other. Fuel cells have many similarities with batteries, but with the fundamental difference that the electrodes are not consumed in the process – a fuel cell will run as long as fuel and an oxidant (air) is provided to the electrodes.